The Goose Squadron Tales
by The-100th-Llama
Summary: Dot is a partly domesticated greylag goose. When she meets Greylag, a wild greylag goose, she starts to teach him a goose version of military. Then they have goslings, a mysterious cat wants to put up gosling as a second favorite food to duckling, and the geese find that there is a duckling that needs their help to find his farm and mother…what will happen? More summary in profile!
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: Hello! This is my second story with more then one chapter. I better explain why you're reading this story (you can just start reading, if you want).**

**The reason is pretty simple. The play for my school this year was ****_Honk! Jr_****, and I was in it. It was really fun, so of course when it ended, we all started crying. Well, some people. I was part of the Goose Squadron in the play (we're the ones that try help the ugly ducking try to find his mom) and I started to wonder how the squadron was formed. How did Dot and Greylag meet? How did their goslings become so random? Did the geese ever had an experience with the cat? This story is my answer to those questions. If you've ever watched Honk, then you'll probably know what is going on. If you haven't…please look Honk up! It'll help you with understanding the story a little better.**

**Honk belongs to George Stiles and Anthony Drewe**

**A note to all my fellow Warriors fans: **

**There's a cat in here, but this is a cat that, if he got the chance, would eat baby birds. I know, I know, Clan cats eat birds (and other prey) all the time, but think of him as…I don't know, a prey-based Darkstripe?**

**Oh, and here's a poem to start the chapter off. Enjoy reading!**

* * *

_It hardly mattered what time of year  
We passed their farmhouse,  
They never waved,  
This old farm couple  
Usually bent over in the vegetable garden  
Or walking by the muddy dooryard  
Between house and red-weathered barn.  
They would look up, see who was passing,  
Then look back down, ignorant to the event._

_-From _No Tool Or Rope Or Pail, _By Bob Arnold_

* * *

Chapter 1

It all started when a retired military officer decided to get a goose for a pet.

In the 20th century, that wasn't _too_ unusual. Geese were good for keeping watch, even better than, some people said, then watchdogs.

The former military officer lived on a small farm with his wife. The farm had a few crops – things like corn, wheat, and hay – and a large garden. There were about two dozen chickens, and one rooster, that lived in a chicken coop, which was in the fenced-in area in the front yard. In the back yard, there were the crops to one side, and to the other, a muddy, marshy place filled with rocks and reeds and one or two small islands. The marshy place was populated by a few mute swans, which lived there all year.

There was also Dot, a gray goose who was the reason for the old military officer's decision. Up until this point, Dot had been a good "watchdog" type of goose. Now, she seemed mopey and sad, which would have been unacceptable on any other farm. But Dot was the wife's special pet, and the wife could tell when her goose was acting out or sick, and this time, Dot seemed to be sick.

The military officer, after deciding that any vets in the nearby town would only have small white pills that half the time wouldn't even be eaten by Dot, thought the best option was to get a male goose, a gander, to keep Dot company. Maybe that would cheer her up.

The couple, after telling a few friends about their plan – which was a necessary detail in _any_ plan – found out that they could get a goose from a large, famous flock from another country. The officer and his wife went to their bank and found that they had enough money, thanks to interests. They filled out a few forms, sent the money off, and settled down to wait, for their gander to arrive.

The day the gander did arrive, in a large wooden crate, the retired officer's wife was just finishing a meeting for the reconstruction of something-or-other. When she saw the crate, with a loud honking coming from it, she knew it was their gander. After a phone call, the military officer came from the hardware store, in his old green truck, picked up both his wife and the gander-filled crate, and they headed home.

On the way home, the wife brought up the question of naming the new goose. "We have to call him something," she pointed out. "We do have names for a few of the chickens, and Dot, who is the reason we got the gander in the first place. He needs a name," she proclaimed as the green truck rumbled by a neighbor's mailbox. The former officer nodded, keeping his eyes on the dusty road ahead. "I know, dear. I think the best thing is to see what he does when we get home," he told his wife.

When they got home, and the truck stopped, the wife let Dot out from behind the fence, while her husband rummaged in his toolbox for a plier. Dot, however, winged her way up to the crate, and pecked one of the air holes in the top. A loud honking started coming from inside, and Dot leaned forward, trying to look in the holes. She thought she could see _something_ in there…an eye? A flash of feathers?

"Dot!" the wife scolded. "Get down from there. We'll have him out in a moment."

Dot reluctantly hopped down from the truck bed, and stood next to the officer's wife, while the officer started working on cutting a large enough hole in the side of the crate. The crate itself was about five feet high and two feet wide, giving the gander enough room to step from side to side a bit, but not much else.

Finally, with a loud _clang _from the tool, a creaking of boards, and a whirl of feathers, the gander arrived in his new home. He stared around at the chickens, the sky, the two humans, Dot.

The gander flapped down the ground and over to Dot. His feathers were a grayish-brown, with black flight feathers, and an orange beak and feet, same as Dot, only he was an inch or two taller. "Hello," the gander honked.

"Hello," she honked back.

"Where am I?" the gander asked her, glancing around again.

"You're in Britain, in the countryside," Dot told him.

"What's Britain like?" The gander asked, and then answered his question himself. "If it's all like this," he flapped his wingtips, indicating the farmland, "then I think I'll like it."

"I think about half of it is like this," Dot honked thoughtfully. "I've never been outside the farm, but my parents have. They traveled around a lot before coming here," she added quickly. The gander was looking a bit less off balance now, Dot saw, so she kept talking.

"The human that opened your crate, he was in the military. He traveled around a lot, with my parents."

"What's the military?"

"It's something humans started. They use it as a way to defend their countries."

"They _do_?" The gander sounded a little puzzled, but not totally disbelieving. "Oh, like water fights!" he honked, and Dot could tell he seemed to understand now. "My siblings and I used to do that all the time, when we were goslings, before…" he blinked rapidly.

"Yeah," Dot honked quietly. "My siblings and I used to do that, too."

Meanwhile, the officer and his wife were making plans for a goose coop. The chicken coop housed a couple dozen chickens, with more on the way now that the seasons were becoming warmer. It could house one goose, Dot had proved that, but two? That was out of the question.

The retired officer decided that with some scrap wood, and the gander's crate, he could make a goose coop that would be big enough for two geese. But his wife came up with the problem they had discovered in the truck: the gander's name.

"We need to find a good name for him," the wife sighed as she stared at the sky, as if it might give her an answer.

"Look at this!" her husband said as he pointed to a small piece of a paper, a tag that had been attached to the crate. It read:

GREYLAG, GANDER

2 FEET, 7 INCHES

2 YEARS AND 3 MONTHS

HANDLE WITH CARE

"I was thinking we could call the gander Greylag," the officer commented as his wife re-read the tag. "I mean, look at him." He pointed to their new goose, which was busy following Dot around. The geese had finished talking together a while ago, and Dot had decided to show her new friend his new home.

The military officer was right about the gander, even though he didn't know much about geese species. Greylag was a good name for him.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N: Hello!** **Wait a moment… Fireleaf, get up here!**

***Fireleaf, my trusty Warriors cat OC, appears***

**Fireleaf: What's up? **

**Me: WE GOT A REVEIW! *does a victory dance* I thought it would take weeks, this story is so out of the way! Thank you Guest, for cheering me up, and reminding me that this is the first Honk story! Congrats on being Penny!**

**Fireleaf:**** *suddenly montone voice* Moonbeam141 does not own Honk, Greylag, or Dot. She does, however, own the military officer and his wife, the crow that comes up in this chapter, and Leslie the Extremely Boring White Chicken!**

**Leslie: HEY!**

**Dot: That cat is right, admit it.**

**Leslie: *starts singing her own version to the tune of "Look At Him," song from Honk***

**Dot: *stats singing comebacks***

**Me: Oh no… Run! Save yourself! Read the story! If by any chance your brain hasn't exploded from this author's note, you can ask in a ****review if you want to read the parodied version of the song I made up put on here...  
**

**The Greece Islands which Dot mentions are actually some Mediterranean islands. Since Greece is located on the Mediterranean sea, and since Dot, Greylag and Co. are from 1900's central Europe, or at least from central U.K. in this story, I thought it would make sense. I mean no offense to any actual Greece or U.K persons who have a better sense of their countries than I do.**

* * *

so much depends

upon

a red wheel

barrow

glazed with rain

water

beside the white

chickens.  
-Williams Carrlos Williams, The Red Wheelbarrow

**As for this poem… see below.**

* * *

Chapter 2

It had been still chilly, almost spring when Greylag had arrived, and now it was hotter, not yet summer, but close. Suddenly, all the young animals that had been born in springtime decided that now, they had to learn how to live. The retired officer and his wife often saw half grown birds flitting here and there in tree branches over the weeks, and one time, a young deer, which stared, amazed, at the two humans, before running away.

As for the two geese, Dot was teaching Greylag all about military maneuvers. Dot's parents, who had been the mascots of the former officer's group, had picked up almost all of what military people did. They had taught it to Dot, who was now teaching it to Greylag. Greylag, who at first had homesickness, now wanted to learn everything he could about military things. He didn't think it was strange at all.

"After you feel like you've eaten enough, and you preened yourself, there isn't much more to do," he told Dot one day, "So I want to thank you for doing this."

Dot fixed one of her feathers with her beak and said that it wasn't any trouble at all, and she enjoyed it too.

"My father taught me a little about marching," he added. "I think he learned it from staying by a military academy for a while during a migration. He watched lots of young boys practice–drills, right? He taught me a little marching, a couple of miltary words he had picked up from watching. I liked it, and I'm glad that I'm learning about them again. Could we go over the salute?" he added with a touch of unusal shyness. "I want to get it down perfectly."

"Well, I don't know about perfect," Dot honked. "But I can get you saluting pretty well. Alright, stand exactly in front of me."

Greylag shuffled his webs until he was directly in front of Dot, who suddenly wished…that he was closer? It was a very strange feeling. Almost like happiness.

"Now what?" Greylag asked.

"Which wing do you whack enemies with?" Dot countered.

Greylag blinked, ruining Dot's fantasy of a very intense eye staring contest. "The right one," he answered.

"Alright," Dot honked slowly. "Hold it stiff but steady, like you do when you find your self flying into a strong wind, and you have to hold your feathers stiff, so they don't flutter and break you off course."

Greylag blinked, and his eyes filled with amusement. "Remind me why _any_ bird would fly into a strong wind?"

Dot thought about this for a moment. "I suppose if that was the only way to get back home. Have you ever done it?"

"Once," Greylag mumbled. "While migrating for the first time, to the Islands."

"Oh, right," Dot honked. "The Greece Islands. How did it happen?"

"We were staying at a lake for the night," Greylag recalled. "And I had seen some really good grass nearby when we were landing. So I snuck away."

"You snuck away," Dot repeated in disbelief.

"Yes…" Greylag mumbled, sounding a little embaressed. "The grass just looked very good, and it's not a crime to eat during the night, is it? So I flew out to where I had seen the grass."

"Was it good?" Dot wondered out loud. "The grass, I mean."

"Yes, it was good grass," Greylag honked. "And I did get to eat some, but on the way back, the wind changed and started to blow against me."

"What did you do?" Dot asked.

"I tried to get out of the main blast, and found myself skidding on the lake. I almost plowed through a couple of ducks."

"Through ducks," Dot echoed.

Greylag nodded, a hint of a smile on his beak. "Yes, almost through some ducks. So Dot," he continued. "Now that my wing is nice and stiff, how about some saluting?"

* * *

Dot was different from the other geese he had met, Greylag thought. Even though she was a little younger than him, there was something about Dot – her slight sternness while teaching him military operations, yet her jokes while they waddled about the goose coop – that compelled Greylag to start to warm up to the other goose.

Speaking of the goose coop, it was four feet high, and five feet wide. The former military officer, along with some friends, had indeed built it out of scrap wood and the crate Greylag had come in. It was filled with hay, some dried grasses and feathers for the geese to make nests out of. The feathers were there because it was slowly becoming summer, and summer was goose molting season.

The chickens often asked the two geese why they were doing this "military project." Leslie, a large white chicken who laid eggs galore now that it was warm, was the one who asked the most.

"Why," she would squawk in her disapproving voice. "Would you act so military? We're not humans. We're birds, and birds _act like birds_." If Leslie had been able to sniff disapprovingly, she would have.

"We are birds," Dot would tell her after a moment or two of thought. "But we don't have to _act_ like birds all the time. If we all just ate, and preened ourselves, life would be boring. I've had a taste of something else besides all that, and–"

"Now you're acting all military," Leslie interrupted. "It's because of Greylag, isn't it? A gander comes, and you're off trying to get him to pay attention to you! Honestly, Dot," she clucked before the goose, who was silently fuming, could say no, it wasn't because of Greylag, "I know you are geese, and from what I can tell, you are off on a wild goose chase. Military things, honestly…" Leslie's last sentence was muttered as she waddled off.

Dot tried to ignore the chickens, and the little nagging voice that had appeared in her head, which sounded suspiciously like Leslie. Leslie was apparently trying to spread rumors in the henhouse of what happened to geese who didn't act like birds, some of which included DNA testing and/or rabies shots. As far as Dot could tell, none of the chickens were listening.

* * *

One day, about a week after the conversation with Leslie, Dot was telling Greylag about what had happened when the rooster had suddenly seen a herd of deer crash across the road leading to the farm.

"He just sort of flapped his wings, and then let out the loudest cockle-doodle-do I have ever heard," Dot told him, laughing a little. "He seemed terrified by the deer, and they didn't seem to like him either."

Greylag chortled, a goose-like form of laughter. "Did his eyes go all big?"

"Yes, they did."

"Dot," Greylag stopped chortling. "Could I ask you something?"

"Sure," Dot honked, part of her preparing to do another training exercise, yet her heart started to pound a little faster than usual. _Curse that Leslie_, part of her thought. _She's making me think that he likes me more than a friend._

Greylag paused, partly to savor the moment, and partly to make sure his little speech was in order. "As co-captain of this squadron, a position you appointed me to recently, I would like you to be my second in command."

Dot's beak dropped open, secretly pleased at his choice of words, yet still amazed all together. "Your mate?"

"Yes," Greylag honked, sounding hopeful. "That's what I mean."

"Then I would be glad to accept," Dot told him. "Thank you, Greylag."

The military officer and his wife, along with seeing sparrows and deer that summer, also saw their two geese honk at each other, rub their necks together, then fly on top of the goose coop to make plans for the future.

* * *

One day, Dot felt almost ready to lay an egg. She wanted to get immediately to the marshy place – where there were delicious water plants and sturdy reeds to build nests – but she had to satisfy herself with honking at the gate, with Greylag, until the officer's wife opened the entrance in the fence for them. The two geese were now free to explore the farm.

Dot and Greylag headed to the little marsh, skirting the cornfield and going around a large rock to get to it. As they neared the boggy marshland, Greylag offered to scout ahead for anything, nesting places or other animals. Dot let him, having no doubt that she would know a good nesting place when she saw one.

A loud honk from Greylag a few minutes later quickened her pace, for Dot had been nibbling at some grasses here, a clump of pondweed there. Suddenly feeling anxious to see what her mate had found, Dot wove though some reeds, and saw a small pond, with some rocks sticking up here and there, and a little island about the size of a large table. It looked like a good place for raising goslings, Dot had to admit, and it was.

"This looks good," Dot honked. "All we need is a nest."

"A nest?" Greylag's honk rose a little with excitement. "So we are going to have goslings?"

"Yes, we are," Dot told him happily. "I'm going to try to find a good spot to build the nest."

"I'll go get some reeds," Greylag offered. "There's no hay here, and reeds are as good as anything."

Greylag waddled off to a nearby clump of reeds, while Dot examined the island. There was a small bush on it that she hadn't noticed before. It was just big enough for her to get in, and there was enough room for Dot to walk a few steps from front to back. Light filtered in though the leaves, and it seemed like it would give nice shelter until the goslings were old enough to sleep outside. Dot, finished with her inspection, turned around to go outside, when–

"Caw! Caw! Caw!"

_What in the world?_

Dot darted out of the bush, as fast as she could, to see Greylag staring up at the sky, reeds still in his beak. She followed his gaze, and saw a crow, cawing loudly. The crow dived straight at the two geese, then went into a U-turn and settled on top of a boulder nearby.

"What was that, private?" Greylag honked angrily, dropping his reeds, before Dot could chime in her two cents as well. "Were you trying to kill us?"

"I didn't mean to, sir, uh, didn't want to–" the crow stammered, suddenly realizing that the two geese were each twice bigger than him, and gave a sloppy salute.

"Didn't want to do what?" Dot honked at him. "On whose orders did you attack?"

"Uh – orders?" The crow blinked.

Greylag sighed though clenched beak. "Who told you to dive at us like that?"

The crow muttered something that sounded like "…he told me not to…"

"Who told you not to do what?" Dot asked him, wondering if the crow had said _he_ or _she._

"Dive down at geese and ducks," the crow clarified. "My mother." The black-feathered bird glanced at a far-away oak, as if wondering if his mother was going to come out that very moment. Greylag thought, for a moment, something moved among the branches, shaking them. But it didn't look like a crow. It looked like…

"I'm sorry," the crow cawed, unconsciously interrupting Greylag's train of thought. "Do you – do you want me to do anything for you?" He blinked, nervously, at the two geese.

"No," Greylag told him. "Just leave. We don't need nosy crows poking about our place!"

The crow flew off to the oak, cawing loudly.

"Do you think he was telling the truth?" Greylag asked Dot as they snapped off reeds with their beaks.

"Who knows?" Dot wondered, thoughtfully breaking a reed off. "Crows aren't known for being completely honest."

* * *

By sunset, the nest was finished, built out of reeds that Dot had woven into a bowl shape around herself, mixed with dried grasses and a few twigs. It was large enough for her, and some goslings. How many there would be, Dot wasn't sure, but she thought perhaps six.

The retired officer knew about the nest. He had heard Greylag and Dot honking at the crow from the chicken coop, and by the time he got there, the nest was half-done.

"Hello, Dot and Greylag," the old man said. "Going to have goslings, aren't you?"

Dot honked loudly in answer. The former officer chuckled.

"Promise me something, alright?" He leaned down a bit to see the geese better. "I know geese like to migrate, but when the goslings are old enough, could you bring them back to the farm for a few days, for a visit?"

Dot and Greylag glanced at each other. The former military officer waited as the two geese exchanged little honks and gurgles.

Finally, Dot pumped her head up and down, and let out a loud honk. She agreed.

The old man smiled to himself as he walked back home.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N: I'm not very sure what to say…don't throw any rotten tomatoes?**

**Anywho, I've come back with an update. I've had a hard time deciding whether or not to have this chapter and new chapter be together. I'm deciding to separate it into two parts, and if you don't like it, or I decide to change them into separate chapters - don't worry. There won't be any changing of the content if I decide on separate chapters.**

**Now, to reviews. You can skip this part if you want, because it's going to be long.**

**Laserbeam13: Yup, Barnacles appears in this chapter, and next…and pretty much every chapter after that, along with everyone else…yes, I made characters for all eight of us. The goslings going to be fluffy at first, and I mean like ****cotton ball fluffiness. Thanks for the compliment!**

**TheSameGuest/ArtemisCarolineSnow: Yay! You got an account. Even though I already welcomed you to Fanfiction, there s no reason to not do so here. CLAP EVERYONE, FOR A NEW MEMBER! And yes, we do need more Honk stories. There's already one up, in fact, by dreylag69. Check it out if you want.**

**GuestAgain: I don't know what those are…places in Britain? If you're wondering where the geese are…In a more rural, nature-filled place than London. **

**SmarterThanArty: Sorry, bud, this is one of those serious stories. :( But there's a scene next chapter including tea. You might find that funny.**

** -Guest: Good. You repaired your brain because I _really_ don't want to get sued…did you say Trollstar or Trollestia, by the way? **

**Honker4lyfe: GASP! Thank you so much! I did check out dreylag69's fanfiction. You're right; it is pretty good!**

**Now the part of the poem, and you can start reading!**

* * *

I'm scrambling an egg for my daughter.

"Why are you always whistling?" she asks.

"Because I'm happy."

And it's true,

Though it stuns me to say it aloud;

There was a time when I wouldn't

Have seen it as my future.

-_From _Egg, _by C. G. Hanzlicek_

* * *

Chapter Three

Dot had been right in wanting to get to the marsh quickly, because a few days after the two geese got into a routine of swimming about a little, eating delicious pondweed, and simply feeling free, she laid the first egg.

It happened, it fact, on the fourth day they had been there – enough time for Dot to add to finishing touches to her nest and eat more than usual, as when she would be laying on the eggs, she would not have a lot of time for eating. It was enough time for Greylag to make the acquaintance of some other birds – mostly mute swans –and to scout out the surrounding area a little. The egg laying happened quietly. When an animal gives birth, there is usually a lot of pain involved, but not birds. Birds just lay eggs, and wait for them to hatch, keeping them warm and safe, and Dot was no exception.

When Dot realized that there was an egg in her nest, she was suddenly filled up with a five second burst of horror.

_What have I _done?

It was more of an initial shock that they were, in fact, going to have goslings. It wasn't a daydream any more. It wasn't false at all. It was true.

The shock, horror, whatever Dot felt, was replaced with a burst of happiness. This egg – this creamy white egg in the middle of her nest – was what she had been waiting all her life for. She hadn't known it before, because she never knew what being a mother was like…but now Dot knew that soon, she might just be a mother. And that felt good.

When she told Greylag, that yes, there was an egg, he felt a rush of pride that came after a stunned silence, and like Dot, he felt the pieces of his life click together a little more. Both gray-feathered geese went to sleep happy that night.

Two more days passed, and Dot laid another egg. She tried to lay an egg every day. She succeeded only twice, but the rest of the time, two days passed. She supposed it was her body recovering from laying an egg and whatnot, but still, she was relived when ten days passed, and six eggs were in the nest, being kept warm by her feathers. Occasionally, Dot could see Greylag though the flickering spaces between the leaves in the bush. He was either talking to some of the other birds that lived on the marsh, or swimming back and forth, or preening.

Dot, far from relishing the chances she got to see outside, was lapsing into periods of boredom. She wished that one of the former mother birds that lived all the time on the marsh would visit her, and give her some advice, even though Dot knew that mothering was instinctual.

One day, her wish was granted.

Snowy, a mute swan came to visit. She had heard about Dot and Greylag – any newcomers to the marsh were known by all before a day was out – and the swan wanted to introduce herself. She also wanted to look over Dot's eggs, as she explained to a slightly baffled, but nerveless relived that someone had come, Dot.

The soon-to-be mother goose tucked some loose down around her eggs, and shuffled off for a moment to let the mute swan take a look. Snowy looked over the eggs carefully, noticing that two of the eggs were another white then the rest. It wasn't that noticeable, except to an experienced mother. And Snowy was exactly that.

After Dot had settled back down on her eggs, Snowy began her little speech.

"Dot, your eggs are really something."

"Thank you," Dot honked, pleased with the other bird's complement.

"Of course, I do prefer grayish eggs myself, but white eggs are nice as well. I've heard that some chickens can lay eggs besides white. You know, real green, blue, and light brown eggs, and not those fake eggs that get passed around in springtime. All those different colors, Dot! Maybe those humans do have some sense in making those fake colorful eggs."

"Maybe." Dot liked Snowy, she had to admit. The mute swan was old, about ten years in human time, and she seemed wise in Dot's eyes, although most of the time she talked about goslings, and cygnets, and eggs. It was almost laughable, but Snowy did grow serious one time.

"Dot, my mate and I saw this cat – I think a female – a few times. She's all black, with green eyes. Sneaky, too."

"A cat!" Dot exclaimed. "Has she spoken to you?"

"No," Snowy snorted indigently. "We've only seen her. I think she lives on a nearby farm, or maybe is migrating, and decided to come here to see if she could get some cygnets."

"Get some…that's terrible!"

"It's what cats do," Snowy shrugged. "I've met only on cat that seemed good –a brown tabby. A little standoffish and aloof, but at least she had no interest in eating swans."

"Mm," Dot murmured, wondering if _any_ cats were good. It didn't seem likely.

Snowy glanced out the bush entrance. "Oh my! Look at the time!" Dot craned her neck to see that the sun was past noon.

"Now, if I were you–" Snowy started as she waddled out from the bush, but was cut off by Dot

"Don't worry," the gray goose told her. "I'll tell Greylag – my mate. He'll keep a lookout."

"Alright," Snowy honked, getting ready to take off. "And Dot, your goslings – love them. They will be the pride of your heart and the joy of your life."

"Thank you!" Dot called from her nest as Snowy soared up to the sky. "Thank you!"

Later, Dot would wonder why Snowy had given her that last piece of advice. It seemed rather old-fashioned, and besides, wasn't it a given that she would love her goslings? Wasn't it?

But for now, she accepted it.

* * *

"A _cat_?" Greylag frowned. They had finished their dinner of pondweed roots and grasses, and Dot had, after some hesitation, told Greylag about Snowy. "Are you sure that swan was telling the truth?"

"Yes," Dot honked, "She seemed to really believe it – I don't think it was just bad eyesight. Anyway, Snowy said her and her mate. Two birds have a better chance of seeing a cat than one."

"Oh, well," Greylag sighed, giving in for the time being, putting the possible mistaking of a cat in the back of his brain for the time being, "Dot, do you ever get tired of sitting on the eggs? Not that I hope you do," he added hastily. "I just wanted to know how you were getting on."

"I don't get tired of sitting on them very often," Dot told him thoughtfully, "It doesn't bother me as much, not being able to move about more. I thought as more time passed, it would get so I couldn't stand it, but that's the opposite of what is happening. I think it has something to with the eggs getting nearer to hatching."

Eggs could change, both geese knew that. They could seem as breakable to china plates to humans, yet there wasn't any denying that they change from hard shell and soft yolk to a living, breathing creature. China plates, however beautiful, couldn't do that.

"I'll keep first watch," Greylag offered, relieved that Dot and the eggs were all right, but wanting to get on with his nighttime duty.

"Not right now," Dot shook her head. "Dear, you need to sleep. I haven't had as much to do today, except sit, and you've been flying around the marsh."

Greylag agreed, and drifted off to sleep on the pond, leaving Dot to watch, keep her eggs warm, and think.

* * *

As the days, then weeks, passed, Dot stayed on her eggs all the time. She still felt a bit bored now and then, but a stronger urge kept her busy; one to keep her eggs safe.

One afternoon, Dot found that one egg had a crack in the shell. It was only just visible, but some motherly instinct could tell her that the egg was hatching.

Feeling that there wasn't a reason to wait in idle boredom for the egg to hatch, she settled into a more comfortable position so the hatching egg wouldn't be crushed, and slipped into a doze.

She found herself in the sky – the sun warm on her feathers, air currents flowing around her. The soon-to-be mother goose found an updraft, and took it. For a while, she flew around in the sky, completely happy to be able to stretch her wings, if only in a dream.

Of course, that peacefulness couldn't last.

Dot noticed a storm cloud nearby. She swerved to avoid it, hoping that she could avoid this cloud and get on with flying, but found herself stuck in the middle of the cloud. Literally stuck, because Dot found that she couldn't move.

Twisting and turning in desperation, she told herself it was only a dream – even though it was on its way to becoming a nightmare – and that she would wake up soon. She had to.

By some miraculous luck, Dot found that she could move her head, even though the rest of her body was paralyzed. It wasn't the best luck, she realized, as she turned her head downward to see two green orbs. They stared up at her, unblinking, never moving.

That was when she woke up.

Panting with relief, Dot suddenly felt a flash of terror, and a jumbled mess of thoughts rustled through her head like fallen leaves. _Those green orbs…eyes…_cat_ eyes…her eggs…were they safe…Greylag…Greylag_!

"Greylag!" she honked as loudly as she dared. "Greylag!"

* * *

Meanwhile, Greylag was enjoying some nice grass nearby, when he heard Dot calling his name. Almost reflexively, he scanned the reeds surrounding him for the cat, or any other predators.

Nothing.

Taking off, Greylag swore he saw a flash of fur…no, a green eye winking at him. It was nothing, he assured himself. But he still flew faster.

Why was Dot calling to him? She knew that he would come back to the nesting site, usually after darkness fell. But it wasn't dark yet, Greylag thought, taking an updraft, as anything that would make him go faster was welcome. The sun wasn't even setting. It was still high in the sky.

As he landed in the pond next to the nesting site, Greylag was aware of a sudden silence. No insects were chirping, there were no frogs…and Dot wasn't calling to him.

Paddling over to the small island, Greylag quietly called out, "Dot? Are you alright?"

Dot poked her head out of the bush. "Greylag!" she gasped, "You're okay!"

"Of course I'm okay," Greylag honked, feeling confused. Dot seemed worried, and now she was looking at him with a mixture of relief and anxiety. "Why were you calling me? Did you see the cat?" he asked.

"I'm not sure," Dot honked slowly, thoughtfully. "I had this dream," she started to explain, as Greylag came closer, "I was flying, and it just felt so good, like flying after a molting time."

Greylag nodded. He could understand that, because flying after regaining your feathers did feel great, like being able to breathe again. But why had Dot been so afraid, of a dream of all things? The aviator goose captain didn't know what to do with dreams. They were pleasing, sometimes, but they didn't do anything to you. Unless…

"And then, this storm whirled up," Dot continued, "I tried to fly away, but then I got lost in it, and Greylag…" she shivered, making sure the eggs weren't being crushed at the same time. "I saw the cat."

"What?" Greylag honked, shocked, looking around at the reeds as if the cat might be hiding there. "You saw the cat? Where was she?"

"She was just staring at me," Dot shuddered, "In my dream. And then I woke up."

"And that's when you started calling me," Greylag clarified, feeling the shock start to ebb away, replaced by understanding. "Is that it?"

Dot nodded, "Yes, I just felt so terrified, I didn't know, really, what else to do."

"It was a dream, Dot," Greylag tried to make her think logically, "Just a dream. There wasn't any cat."

"Yes," Dot sighed. "I know. Anyway," she honked, forcing herself to sound more cheerful, "Do you want to check on the eggs?"

Greylag blinked at the sudden change in conversation, but then made a quick decision: anything that got Dot's thoughts away from her nightmare was good.

Dot stiffened as she felt something move under her. Was it a bug? No, it couldn't be a bug; the movement was too big for that…

Something gave out a muffled peep.

What if it is what I hope it is? Dot thought, plunged into a whirlwind of sudden mothering as Greylag looked on in confusion, not having heard the peep.

Finally, Greylag honked out a question. "Dot…what's happening?"

"The eggs," was the only thing Dot could think of to say. "I think they're hatching. Or at least one of them…"

Sure enough, there was a slightly damp wriggle under Dot, a small rustling in her chest feathers, and then…

A newly hatched gosling poked its head out of its mother's soft gray chest feathers, and let out an astounded peep at the world.

Geese, and most birds, don't have a great sense of smell, but if the two new parents had excellent smelling senses, they would have smelled the damp, new, slightly dusty smell of the newly hatched gosling.

The gosling looked up at Dot, and let out a wondering peep. Dot gave it a small nod, feeling a small lump in her throat, and gave a sort of a crooning honk back. It was the same honk that she had made to the unhatched eggs, so they could get used to her voice, and she was using it now to let the baby gosling know that she was its mother.

She succeeded.

Greylag, for a moment lost for words, suddenly came up with a military phrase Dot had taught him. "I guess one of our eggs finally got inducted, huh?"

"Yes," Dot murmured affectionately as she gently prodded the gosling over with her beak, checking that it was okay, "Yes, I guess you could say that our gosling just got officially taken into the military, but it's a good military, right?" Dot glanced up from her prodding to stare at Greylag hard, with the mother of all worries in her eyes. "No one's going to get hurt in a training session, and we're all going to live through our missions, right?"

"Right," Greylag promised as he reached down to see his newly hatched gosling better, "That's absolutely right."


	4. Chapter 4

**Hello! I'm sorry I didn't update last month; I was getting used to school (why do they give us so much homework on weekends?) and this chapter took awhile to write. There was also some writer's block included…**

**If you do review, I want to ask if you would tell me three things:**

** •Is this story boring? I feel like I'm adding too many details and not enough action.**

**•Do you like the poems, and that I have poems alongside chapters?**

**•Should I have this chapter be Chapter 4, or leave it as part two of Chapter 3?**

**Alright, then. Enjoy reading!**

**(Side note: I dressed up as a goose for Halloween. A pinkfoot goose. It was fun.)**

**Reviews:**

**ArtemisCarolineSnow: Thanks for reviewing. You are welcome for the welcome! And 'The Life and Times of Penny the Swan' sounds cool.**

* * *

One summer  
I went every morning  
to the edge of a pond where  
a huddle of just-hatched geese

would paddle to me  
and clamber  
up the marshy slope  
and over my body,

peeping and staring—  
such sweetness every day  
which the grown ones watched,  
for whatever reason,

serenely.  
Not there, however, but here  
is where the story begins.  
Nature has many mysteries,

some of them severe.

\- From_ At The Pond_, by Mary Oliver

* * *

Chapter 4

The first hatched gosling stayed mostly in the nest for the rest of the day, which, just two hours after noon, quickly turned to evening, then night. The gosling stayed partly in the nest because the sky had gotten cloudy soon after it had hatched, so there was the threat of rain, and partly because Dot had decided to wait for a swimming lesson with all six of the goslings.

So except for a few excursions to nibble on grasses and pondweed the next day, under the close supervision of Dot and Greylag, the first gosling stayed.

The two proud parents were settling down for sleeping – or at least, Dot to sleep, Greylag to watch, then Dot to watch and Greylag to sleep. The gosling let out a small snore, huddled in the nest beside Dot, who woke up from her doze with a surprised snort.

Glancing at her unnamed son – Greylag had confirmed that they did have a son – Dot's newfound mothering skills kicked in.

"Greylag?" she honked quietly.

She could hear the sounds of splashing from outside the bush, then a slightly squishy waddling, and then Greylag poked his head into the entrance, a piece of pondweed hanging from his beak.

"What's the matter?" he honked, waddling in. "What is it?"

"You have some pondweed on your beak," Dot pointed out. "And we need to name our son."

"Have you thought of any names?" Was Greylag's first question.

"I wanted to see them first," Dot admitted, as Greylag got the pondweed off, "And now that I have seen him… well, now's a good time as any."

Both geese glanced at the gosling. He was still rather fluffy – as all new animals are – and underneath all the fluff was light brown. Some of it was a little darker, some of it was lighter. He had a black beak and flippers.

Greylag broke the silence. "Dot…have you seen any greylag goslings? You know, our geese species…" he trailed off as Dot nodded.

"Of course I have," she honked, "I can remember seeing my siblings when we were young. Why?"

Greylag took a breath. "It's just…well…does he look like your siblings?"

Dot narrowed her eyes at him, but then cocked her neck to get a better look at her son.

She blinked.

And then she answered, sounded worried and concerned. "No…they…they were more yellowish. Not as brown. What…what does that mean?"

"I think," Greylag tried to get his words around a sudden, small lump in his throat. "I think it means that we were parasited."

Dot blinked at Greylag, at the gosling, and at the ground. "So you're saying," she began in a slow voice, as if she couldn't believe it, "That I didn't lay this egg? That another goose put this egg in my nest while I was out for a few minutes, and I just thought I had laid an egg and didn't notice?" Her voice wasn't charged with unbelieving fury, but sadness. Deep, deep sadness.

"Alright then," she continued before Greylag could say anything, "I'll accept it. I'll except that another goose laid this egg, but she gave it to me. That should count for something, shouldn't it? I'll be the best mother I can be to this gosling, better than that goose that laid his egg ever would."

Greylag swallowed. "Dot…I might not be right…we'll have to wait for his feathers to come in to really know."

"I know," she honked quietly. "I know."

"Look," Greylag honked, feeling uncomfortable with Dot's sadness filling the bush like fog, "We still do have to think up a name for him."

"Yes, we do," Dot agreed, feeling a tad better. "Got any ideas?"

"We shouldn't name him after the color of his feathers," Greylag commented. "It wouldn't make him feel good, being named something that sets him apart."

"Alright," Dot murmured. "Then what should we…"

She trailed off as the still-unnamed gosling blinked awake. He yawned, snapped his beak at a loose reed next to him, and then fell back asleep with a small snore.

"That's it!" Dot whispered as to not wake up the gosling.

"What?" Greylag couldn't help feeling a bit of excitement.

"We'll name him Barnacles."

"Barnacles? Why?" Greylag asked.

"I don't feel like naming him after a plant," Dot responded. "I've always thought of barnacles as an interesting sort of animal, and it's a nice name, and I thought…well, he's our first hatched. I wanted to name him something special. Have you ever seen barnacles?"

"Yes," Greylag nodded. "I have. You're right–" he nodded to the gosling, "–there are many different colored barnacles in the world, and since we don't know what colored feathers he'll grow into, there will be a chance that his feathers match to a barnacle. It makes sense."

"And even if his feathers are grey like ours," Dot added, half to herself. "I have a feeling he'll like being named after something that swims when it's young and remains in one place when it's older. A paradox. Yes, he'll like that…"

The two geese finally fell asleep after that, Dot feeling a small warmth in her chest – or was it right beside her, covered under her wing? – at the thought of Barnacles.

The next day, Dot was coming back to the nest after a quick nibbling at pondweed, and, sitting down on her nest, saw a crack in one of the eggs. Thankfully, Dot could hear the scratch, scratch, scratch of a gosling trying to break free, so the egg hadn't been smashed.

Barnacles, having snuggled down next to Dot, popped his head up and peeped, "Mama, what's that noise?"

"It's your brother or sister, tying to get out of their own egg," Dot told the small brown gosling.

Barnacles cocked his head to one side. "Did I do that too?" he peeped as the scratching noise died away. Dot nodded, but bent down to check that there was a hole in the side of the egg.

There was.

Peering at the small hole, Dot felt, once again, that she was staring down at a wooden crate, filled up with a hopeful expectancy, and thinking she saw a glint of an eye or the flash of feathers…

Shaking the memory away, she turned to Barnacles and honked, "You better take a nap." When the young gosling started to complain, she added, "I'll wake you up as soon as this egg hatches. I promise."

So Barnacles fell into sleep, while an echo of Dot's words floated in her head.

_I promise._

She knew that it wasn't just a promise to wake Barnacles up.

It was, if you looked at it in another way, a promise to be his mother, to make promises to him that would be kept.

"Greylag?"

For the second time in about a day, Greylag came into the bush. This time, he didn't have any food on his beak.

"Hmm? Is it some tea, old chap?" the gander asked.

"There's another egg hatching," Dot honked – quietly, of course, as to not wake Barnacles up. "And no, there's no tea."

Greylag sighed, "Blast that shipping company…I expected there to be tea here soon…"

"You asked a shipping company for tea?" Dot couldn't help feeling, well, a little skeptical, "A _human_ shipping company?"

"Of course not," Greylag responded. "Do you think I can speak the human language, eh?"

"No," Dot answered. "Could we get back to the matter at hand – wait, what's that noise?"

The sound of talking – humans talking – was coming from outside, mixing with several honks from birds. Dot blinked as Greylag waddled out of the bush with a strange sense of urgency about him.

_What's he up to?_

From between the leaves of the bush, not wanting to have gotten up from her nest, Dot could just make out several humans throwing something on the water from a mud-free distance. It looked like the stale bread the military officer's wife gave sometime to the chickens and Dot, only this time, slightly different.

She spotted Greylag, among some ducks and few mute swans – but no Snowy – and most of them were trying to get to the pieces of bread-like food on the small pond.

How had the humans even come here? Dot wondered. Perhaps the retired military officer had given them permission.

Snatching up a piece of bread, Greylag swam back to the bush in a zig-zag way, finally disappearing into the reeds, and after a few minutes, paddling over to the entrance. He dropped the piece of bread on the ground with a soft, slightly wet, _thump_.

"What was that?" Dot asked curiously as she looked at the bread. "And is that bread?"

"No," Greylag replied thoughtfully. "I think it's a biscuit. That was humans, giving us some bread and biscuits. Anyway," he nudged it toward Dot, seeming proud, "Here's your tea."

"But there's no actual herb-filled water," Dot protested. "And anyway, you got it. You should have some."

Greylag stared at her, looked a little astounded.

"What?" she asked.

"It has some type of herb on it," he pointed out. "And it's a little soggy, so there you are. Water tasting of herbs," he clarified as he split the biscuit in two with his beak. "There. Part of it for each of us."

"Oh, well, thank you," Dot honked as she pecked at the biscuit. "Now, how about I show you that egg?"

Feeling slightly stiff – maybe it was from sitting so long with clouds overhead – Dot got to her webs, waking Barnacles up.

"Has it hatched yet, Mama?" he peeped. "Has the egg hatched?"

"We're checking that right now," Dot honked to him, shuffling a bit to the side to see the egg better, then asked him, "How about you have some biscuit?"

As Barnacle started to happily peck at the biscuit, Dot turned her attention to the egg. The hole was wider now – the gosling had been hard at work while the humans had been throwing bread – and Dot could just see a bit of fluffy down, and a tiny beak, inside.

Leaning down closer to the eggshell, she whispered, "Come on, little one. You can do it. Just keep pecking. Mama's waiting for you."

She didn't know what else to say, wasn't even sure if the gosling had heard her, so Dot did something else.

She checked over the other eggs.

Only one other egg, looking a little dirty – Dot wondered how that had happened – showed signs of hatching, and it would take a while. There was only one crack, but Dot could just hear a scratch, scratch, scratch coming from inside.

She was still looking over the other three eggs when she heard Greylag honk, "How are the eggs doing?"

Shuffling slowly back onto the nest, and putting the two hatching eggs in a safe position by nudging them with her beak, Dot told him, "They're going fine, I think. One egg seems close to hatching, and there's another egg where the gosling made a crack." Pausing for a moment, she added, "I hope there's a daughter in one of the eggs."

"Will I get sisters and brothers?" Barnacles peeped, swallowing a tiny beakful of biscuit, and sounding like that was the best gift ever.

"You might," Dot told him. "And talk after you swallow, not while you're doing it."

"Right, Mama," Barnacles nodded, and waddled back over to the nest. "I'm going to take–" he yawned "–some more napping right now."

"Alright," Dot honked, lifting up her wing so Barnacles had a place to sleep that was warm, "Have nice dreams, and I'll wake you up when the egg hatches."

As small snoring came from under Dot's wing, ensuring Barnacles was asleep, the mother goose pecked at the remains of the biscuit. Using her tongue to get any crumbs off her beak – some biscuits were remarkably sticky – she turned to Greylag.

"Do you think our eggs will be alright?" she asked him bluntly.

"To me, that's a definite affirmative," Greylag told her, "But why would you have any doubts?"

"The cat," Dot listed her worries, "A cold day, lots of rain, a fox –"

"Dot," Greylag cut her off, "That's what the farm is for."

Dot blinked at her mate. "What are you talking about?"

Greylag took a breath. "The farm…if we're in a mayday situation, then one of us could fly over and alert them."

"How?" Dot's usually good temper felt slightly strained. "We can't speak their language…"

"No, we can't," Greylag agreed, "but we could honk enough…try to let them know to follow us…"

Dot sighed, "Alright. Good point. And the retired military officer did seem to want us to come before migrating. I suppose we could go there after the goslings get flight feathers, and take it easy before we start."

A worried, tense silence filled the small space. Dot wasn't sure what would have come of it if Barnacles, now awake, hadn't poked his head out from under her wing, and peeped, "Mama! Mama! The egg is hatching!"

Sure enough, when Dot looked at the space in the nest where she had placed the egg that was close to hatching, it was cracking open.

A small gosling emerged, covered in slimy yolk, and with a piece of eggshell stuck to one wing. Dot leaned down to poke it off, and the gosling looked up at her.

"Peep?" It questioned, and then again.

"Peep? Peep peep peep _peeeeep_!"

"Hello, little one," Dot honked quietly to the gosling after it had stopped peeping for a moment. "I'm your mother."

The gosling responded with another chorus of peeping, then shook itself all over, trying to get some of the egg yolk off. After it had finished cleaning itself off, the gosling snuggled next to Dot.

"Don't worry, Dot."

She looked up from checking that the gosling, who was now dozing off, was okay, to see Greylag next to her.

She could tell that he had pushed the worries about migration to the back of his beak. "I think that it's affermative," Greylag honked to her quietly, "that this gosling will be alright too."

* * *

The second-hatched gosling was another male, and this time, it was a tinge yellower than Barnacles. Definitely a greylag gosling.

Not that it mattered whether he was a greylag gosling or something else, Dot thought to herself later, after the second gosling had woken up from his nap. She watched Barnacles and his brother, from the entrance into the bush, sitting on the remaining four eggs. The two goslings each peered into the pond, dipped their beaks in, then started investigating a patch of grass.

His brother. Barnacle's brother.

The words had come so naturally to Dot – but why wouldn't they? Barnacles was the other gosling's brother, and Dot was his mother.

As far as the mother goose was concerned, that was all there was to say about it.

* * *

They named the second-hatched Snowy, because he would grow up to have white on some of his feathers, and snow, of course, was white. Also, Snowy talked a lot, and he reminded Dot of Snowy the mute swan – they both were chatty. But she didn't tell Greylag that.

Later in the day that Snowy hatched, a third gosling broke out of her egg – the egg Dot had noticed was a little dirty. She was quieter than her brothers, but she had a chortle – a goose laugh – that happened many times at their jokes, whether they were funny or not. Dot thought her fluff many have been a bit less yellow and a bit more brown than Snowy's, but Dot didn't care that Pinkfoot – which was the name of her first-hatched daughter, named after her later-to-be pink feet – might have different feathers when she grew up.

The day after Snowy and Pinkfoot joined Barnacles in exploring the world, the last three eggs hatched – a male, and two females, all the same yellowish-brown that Snowy was. Greylag named one of his daughters Piper, because her peep seemed to go on a higher pitch than the rest. Also – as he told Dot – one time he had heard a piper playing a flute when he was still a gosling, and he wanted something to remind him of the place where he grew up.

Sandy, which was what Greylag named the last male gosling, after his fluff, was quieter, like Pinkfoot, but his was a serious quiet that only went away when he was talking with his sisters and brothers, when he seemed to enjoy himself – a lot.

The last gosling's personality seemed to be a little stubborn – more stubborn and independant then most birds. When she first got out of her egg, and tumbled into the reed-woven nest, she clambered to her webs and tried to get out of the nest herself wthout help. So Dot named her Floe, partly after the mother goose's sister, also named Floe, and because ice floes were independent, just what Floe wanted to be.

The next morning, after Sandy, Piper, and Floe had joined their brothers and sister in the world, Dot decided that it was time for the six of them to finally swim around the pond. About three days had passed since Barnacles had first hatched, but the mother goose had wanted all her goslings to learn how to swim at the same time. And really, three days weren't that long. The goslings that had been hatched yesterday also needed some time to rest after getting into the world at last, as all young animals do.

Of course, Barnacles, and later all of his brothers and sisters, had explored the grass patches, and the reeds, and had dipped their beaks into the pond for a drink. Yet, they hadn't swam in it.

But today was the day that all six of them could.

* * *

Bird-watchers, more often then not, carry around binoculars. While that's something that most of them have in common, something they do not have in common is getting to see the first swim of a gosling, or cygnet, or any other young water bird.

The first swim of the goslings happened on an early morning, just before the middle of summer. The morning was warm, and the sky was clear. No clouds shut away the sun, which had recently appeared on the east horizen, turning yellow, then reddish, then to an amber color.

The goslings dipped their feet into the water, much more slowly that Dot expected. It was still early morning. It didn't feel that nippy to her, but most likely the goslings were still very unused to getting their unfeathered webs used to water in the early morning of a summer day.

Snowy's beak, which later the geese would consider unsual if it wasn't moving, was going about a million mile a minute. He had gone from dipping his webs in to casiously paddling in the pond, nearby the bank. He was also asking lots of questions while his brothers and sisters got their webs, the part that wouldn't be protected by feathers, ready to go to the water.

"Wow, the water's a lot colder than I expected. What's that underwater? Mama, do snakes live underwater?"

"Not to my knowledge," Dot answered calmly. Greylag, swimming beside her, felt rather pleased to strech his legs underwater. There was a feeling of weightlessness, but Greylag knew that his webs would hold him up fine.

"What about…" Snowy thought very hard for a moment. "What about beetles, Mama? Do they live underwater?"

"Some of them glide on top of the water, very quickly," Dot told him. "But I don't think any live under the water."

"Oh," Snowy peeped. "This is–"

Whatever he was about to say was drowned out by a sudden _peeeep_ of delight as the normally quiet Barnacles hopped into the pond, accompined by splashing.

"Honestly," Floe peeped loudly from the bank. "Wait for us to get in the water, then we'll get wet." She and the other four goslings hadn't gotten in the pond yet, still testing the water with their webs, but Floe had been the closest to the shore, so she had gotten most of the water on her.

"Sorry," Barnacles peeeped from next to Snowy, who added,

"Your loss that you didn't get in first."

Dot looked as if she was about to scold Snowy for that last comment, but Greylag gave a small nudge, unseen by the goslings. Let them be, his eyes seem to say. It's their first swimming lesson. After this, you can repremind them all you want.

With that, the rest of the goslings jumped in the pond too.

Dot looked at the goslings – her goslings, she thought with a surge of pride – reflexivly start to paddle with their webbed feet, from where she was holding herself still in the water by paddling against an underwater current. "Come on," she honked to Greylag, who was still swimming next to her, "we should really go over with them. And Greylag," her honk grew more serious, "Don't tell them about the cat. Tell them…tell them about about other ducks, and humans, and military. Our version of military, anyway. Give them their marching orders."

Greylag nodded, then followed by Dot – who merely swilved around in the water and let the underwater current carry her a little way – swam over to the goslings, who were busy nibbling at some pondweed not to far fromo the bank of the pond.

"Attention," Greylag honked. The goslings glanced up from their pondweed and peered up at him.

Snowy let out a peep. "Hello! What are you going to talk about?"

Greylag glanced at Dot. Her eyes seemed to say, _Don't worry about it. Just talk._

And so Greylag did.

"I'm going to talk about ducks, Snowy," he told the gosling.

"Ducks?" Sandy peeped. "They're birds too, right?"

"Yes. Ducks are like us. They fly, they swim, they preen, and do all the other small things that make waterfowl, waterfowl. But ducks can be different from us. For one thing, they quack instead of honking."

"They don't honk?" Pinkfoot peeped curiously.

"No," Greylag answered. "They don't honk."

None of the geese there guessed that after many months, Greylag's words about ducks would seem true.

"Even though," Greyalg continued, "I don't think you need any training in swimming, or knowing what to eat, or flying, you might need training in military."

The little goslings stared at one another, totally and completly confused by this new word.

"Military?" Sandy peeped. "What's military?"

"Military is something humans use to protect their country, although your mother and I have adapted it for geese," Greylag explained. The goslings blinked.

"Humas!" Snowy exclaimed, flapping his tiny wings and looking excited. "We're going to eat humas?"

"No, Snowy," Greylag told him. "Humas is a edible plant spread. We are not going to eat it. Anyway, I said humans."

"Oh," Snowy peeped after a moment or two, trying to wrap his head around that. "What are humans?"

Greylag and Dot shared a glance. How do you explain to your goslings that humans are the most unpredictable animal in the world?

"Humans have fur, and skin, and they can't fly," Greylag told the goslings, who blinked at his description. "They aren't really bad, just different," he quickly added. "Do you understand?"

The goslings nodded. They understood.

"Alright then," Greylag honked. "Who's up for an exploration of the pond?"

The goslings peeped excitedly.

"Everyone, get into a line. Dot, you can lead the way, and I'll bring up the rear," he announced, then the goslings got into a line, with comments like,

"Ow! Snowy, you bumped me!"

"I'm not moving, Sandy! This line is straight enough, anyway."

"I felt a raindrop! Is it raining?"

"The sky is clear," Dot honked over her shoulder, as she swam up to be in front of Barnacles, who was the first gosling in the line. "It was probably just a splash. Come on, everyone, into a line."

The goslings did, eventually, get into a line, and Greylag felt a slow sense of pride as he paddled behind his squadron, his family, as they swam about the pond.


	5. Chapter 5

**A/N: (Posted on Oct. 31, 2015)**

**First of all, to the people who are following and have favorited this, I would like to apologize for not updating for a year. I am deeply, terribly sorry that I got caught up in too many things to update. It was unfair to you to not update for a year, especially since I felt like I was too busy. And okay, I was busy, but I still should have written an A/N.**

**However, I am determined that I finish this story. It might take awhile, because of my schedule that I'm still getting used to, but I will do my best to make sure that I don't let this story go on my list of writing projects I abandoned.**

**So, for an update on how the Goose Squadron Tales are going…**

**I've completed a detailed outline for all of the chapters, right down to the epilogue.**

**I've also been getting myself back into the story with writing small parts of chapters over the weekends.**

**I have Thanksgiving break coming up soon (don't we all?) and I'll give you guys another Author's Note then, and an update on how the story's going so far. I don't want to promise a chapter, because I'm not entirely sure if we'll get time off from homework, but I swear that I'll do my best. You people deserve it!**

**I think that's about it. I posted part of Chapter 4 down at the bottom, just to see what you think of it. Good? Bad? Too confusing? Give me all the criteria you want.**

**See you all in a couple of weeks, and I hope you had a good Halloween.**

**-Moonbeam**

* * *

**That was more then a couple of weeks, wasn't it? There some pre-Christmas stuff that got in the way of writing, and this chapter had temporarily gotten lost in the depths of all my documents (one of the main reasons why the preview of Chapter 4 wasn't actually the intended Chapter 4).**

**I've also started to work on a new story, and the ideas won't stop coming for it, so that means there's even less time for this fanfic. I'm going to try and set aside time for this, though, in the amount of time I have for working on things that don't relate to school. (Which isn't much. But there's always the weekends, right?)**

**Here's Chapter 5. I decided to change Part 2 of Chapter 3 into plain old Chapter 4, so this is Chapter 5. Makes things easier, what? (As Greylag would say)**

**Four more days until the world ends...oh, wait, that was for 2000.**

**Thanks to duck liet(Congratulations on being Penny), Spr13gitfanfic4cookidonli (Don't worry,everything will be all right; Ugly &amp; co. will show up later), and ArtemisCarolineSnow (woohoo! You liked the chapter!) for reviewing!**

**This is kind of long, so settle down with some Christmas cookies (or some sort of snack) and read away.**

**[Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters, except for Snowy the mute swan, Sandy, Floe, Piper, the crow, the mother cat, the farmer, or his wife. I also don't own any of the poems that have appeared in this story.]**

* * *

_Acceptance_

_When the spent sun throws up its rays on cloud_

_And goes down burning into the gulf below,_

_No voice in nature is heard to cry aloud_

_At what has happened. Birds, at least must know_

_It is the change to darkness in the sky._

_Murmuring something quiet in her breast,_

_One bird begins to close a faded eye;_

_Or overtaken too far from his nest,_

_Hurrying low above the grove, some waif_

_Swoops just in time to his remembered tree._

_At most he thinks or twitters softly, 'Safe!_

_Now let the night be dark for all of me._

_Let the night bee too dark for me to see_

_Into the future. Let what will be, be.'_

\- Robert Frost

* * *

Chapter 5

As the goslings grew, so did summer. Along with learning how to survive in a world that contained freedom and predators, neither of their parents had forgotten how they wanted to pass on human military skills. So the goslings learned how to salute by putting the right wingtip to their forehead, walking with a military "goose step", and the phrases that Greylag would say. Barnacles and Pinkfoot were especially proud when the aviator goose captain assigned them lookout on walks.

The days went by, cloudy one day and filled with bright sunshine the next. Dot knew it was rather cliché, but she was happy. It was warm, there were plenty of good plants to eat, and the goslings were getting better at swimming; why wouldn't she be happy? She even managed, one day on the pond while she and Greylag were teaching the goslings some water maneuvers, to push her worries about what could happen to the goslings - predators, shootings, and the like - to the back of her beak.

One day, the goslings learned about a flying wedge, a military tactic. It was basically a V shape – like geese used on migration – and used to smash through the enemy's lines. Greylag thought that they could use it in water too, if a fox or a weasel – Dot inwardly hissed at the thought of egg-eating weasels – came to close to one of the banks of the pond. The number of enemies coming at a predator would overwhelm them, and then the animal, formerly hungry for geese flesh, would turn tail and flee.

The goslings, at about three weeks old, still had their fluff. Their feathers wouldn't come until about five weeks later, at the end of summer. Even without feathers, they still could swim, paddling their feet through the water. Both parents decided, however, that the gosling had to wait until they were eight weeks old – or two months, and had feathers – until they could actually help drive off a fox. For now, they could only practice.

Of course, there were complaints.

"I don't _want_ to wait for five more weeks," Snowy peeped, swimming around in the pond. "If a fox comes, I want to help."

Piper glanced at him critically. "If a fox comes, you know that they won't let us help. Anyway, you're too small. A fox could eat you in one gulp."

"Small!" Snowy peeped indignantly. "I'm older than you."

"By a day."

"Still older."

"I'm more mature," Piper countered.

"You're more stubborn," Snowy muttered.

Pinkfoot, cannonballing into the pond, and splashing them both, interrupted them.

"Thanks for making him stop." Piper peeped to Pinkfoot, as Snowy spluttered from the water.

"No problem," Pinkfoot peeped back. "He was getting on my nerves, anyway."

"Hey!" Snowy peeped. "Don't talk about me like I'm not here."

The two female goslings glanced at him, mumbled "Sorry," and then dove underwater.

The actual doing of the flying wedge wasn't that hard. All the goslings had to do was swim as quickly as they could, in the wake of Dot and Greylag, in a V shape. But first, they had to learn how to swim quickly without tumbling headfirst into the pond and getting a beakful of water. It wasn't that hard for them – swimming is part of any waterfowl's natural abilities, after all – but racing around the pond, in a game of tag, was good practice.

"You're it!" Floe peeped to Sandy one morning, smacking him as gently as could be expected over the head with her wing. It was soon after the six goslings had learned the wedge formation. Even Snowy pushed his wanting of more independence aside for a game of tag, among other things.

With five siblings to play with? That was the ideal recipe for a good game of tag, which he liked even better.

Sandy glanced around the pond. The other goslings were waiting for him to make a move, their webs ready to get them out of the way of danger – if the gosling that was It could be called danger.

He inched toward Barnacles, and his older brother crept backwards by pedaling his webs on a backwards angle, a trick they had learned from Greylag the day before.

Slowly, Barnacles told himself as Sandy padded closer, wanting to give the gift of tagging to someone else. Lure him into a sense of confidence…

Sandy padded closer, and closer, and closer.

The suspense, Piper noted from a safe distance away, was terrible.

Part of her hoped it would last.

Barnacles zoomed off into the water as his brother leaned forward, wing outstretched. Sandy followed as well as he could. He was a little smaller than his siblings – just enough to have his webs not give as much force – but Dot had reassured him that he would get bigger.

That morning, Dot and Greylag watched the goslings play from a quieter section of the pond, while also taking a break to eat some pondweed. Occasionally, there were even some small stems, leaves, and pieces of tender grass floating on top of the water. The two molting adult geese snapped up everything avidly, because if they didn't eat for at least half a day, they would most likely starve.

"Did your father teach you anything else about military?" Dot murmured to Greylag as she pecked at a piece of grass.

"Let's see…" the gander honked – quietly. Every parent needs private conversations with one another, and this was one of them. "My father taught me upending – turning down in the water so you didn't have to go all the way down, what? It could be useful."

"Upside down…" Dot murmured to herself. "Upside down… My parents told me something about this…I've got it!" she cried.

Greylag blinked at her. "What, exactly, do you have?" he asked.

"My parents," Dot began. "They told me about a time where the military officer, who was in a danger, and had to go underwater to avoid detection. Or perhaps it was bullets. One of the two, anyway."

"It could be useful," Greylag admitted. "I never did like the look of that crow; to shifty for my taste. Can you remember everything else?"

Dot closed her eyes for a moment, thinking. "There's saluting, and those military phases, and positions…not to mention some aerial maneuvers. My parents told me about how a captain would act on a plane…those loud shiny creatures that fly across the sky…but they never told me how I should train my own goslings." She sighed deeply. "I'm mostly going about this on instinct."

"Well, you taught me, didn't you?" Greylag honked. "Why did they tell you those stories, anyway?"

Dot frowned thoughtfully for a moment, staring down at the water. When she looked back up, her eyes were a little more certain.

"It could have been because there was nothing for us goslings to do," she suggested. "But I like to think it was because they wanted to pass on their stories, so they would have a little part of what they had gone through with their goslings when they died."

"That's a nice thought," Greylag remarked.

The two geese talked with each other for a while, discussing plans. Dot felt better, now that she had told Greylag the reason she had hoped, had thought, had wished that her parents had told her all their stories.

Even if the reason wasn't entirely true, it was nice to tell it to someone else, especially on a sunny day in summer while a game of tag was played in front of you.

* * *

The summer kept growing, from June to July to August, and slowly matured from a hot, lazy season into something more medium. It was slowly turning out to be sort of summer where it isn't too hot or cool, a sort of summer that was slowly, day by day and week by week, coming to an end. This was bad news for schoolchildren in most first-world countries, as well as for migrating birds. The children just had to do back to school; migrating birds were on a clock to get to warmer country before winter set in.

Dot knew that it was customary for graylag geese to lag behind the other migrators, to, in a human sense, procrastinate their migration. Still, as a full time mother goose, she wanted her goslings to know how to fly excellently before the geese started to migrate.

To fly, the goslings needed their feathers. Dot and Greylag, the two adult geese, needed to finish growing their feathers after their one-month molt of their tails and wings.

Yet, as the days of summer kept going past, filled with military training and eating and preening and swimming, Dot found something that might cause flying practice to start sooner then expected. She had, in fact, thought of the possibility when Barnacles had been named.

Barnacles was growing in black feathers, just plumes that were darker around his neck. It was earlier than the other goslings, and Dot was concerned about what to tell him. It was a bit of a rare occurrence to find that a goose couple of a different species had given their son to you, and Dot wondered why. Why had Barnacles' parents given him to her and Greylag? Was it to make sure that they would still have eggs if there was an attack on the nest? It was muddling.

Barnacles, if he noticed it – and he most likely had – didn't approach her. Dot kept preparing to have him ask why he had black feathers and not gray, as graylag geese had, but her preparations weren't needed.

As the rest of the goslings got their own feathers – to Floe and Piper's delight, as they had been itching to have their own plumage for weeks – Dot noticed that Pinkfoot, although excited as her siblings, had become rather fixated on her feathers. Swimming up to her daughter one day under the shade of a few tall reeds by the edge of the pond, away from the other goslings, Dot asked her if everything was alright.

"Affirmative," Pinkfoot honked – the goslings had started to honk more and peep less, and also pick up some words that Greylag used – but she seemed to be thinking of something else. She held up her wing for her mother to see. "Do my feathers seem – I don't know – brown to you? Brownish? Not fully grey?"

"No," Dot told her after looking at Pinkfoot's feathers. "No, I don't see much brown, but it's alright, Pinkfoot," she added as her daughter looked worried. "Greylag geese aren't fully grey. They do have brown colouring in their feathers."

"But my feathers seem more brown," Pinkfoot protested. "And my head _looks_ darker brown, though that may just be the light."

"Pinkfoot," Dot honked. "If you try to stop worrying about this – and I'm guessing you have been worrying about this a lot – I promise I will try my best to get you some answers."

"Answers?" Pinkfoot honked, sounding confused. "How are you going to get answers?"

"I have a friend," Dot told her daughter. "A friend who has lived in this marsh for years. She's old, and wise, and she has to know something about all this."

"Okay," Pinkfoot sighed. "Do you think she knows something about why Barnacles has black feathers?"

"You've noticed?" Dot clarified; she was filled up again with a worry about her other-species son.

"Yes," Pinkfoot nodded. "I don't know if Floe and Piper really notice – they're preening over their new feathers a lot lately. It was Floe who told me that she liked how my feathers were a nice brown shade."

"She didn't tease you about it, did she?"

"No. Don't worry about that, Mama. But Snowy has defiantly realized something's up, and he asked me about why I thought Barnacles had different feathers."

"And?" Dot asked with a lingering sense of worry still there.

"And I told him to mind his own business, and that Barnacles' feathers weren't his," Pinkfoot honked with pride layered on top of her words.

"Alright," Dot honked, relived. "Come on, let's get you back to the rest of the flock," she added, her mothering instincts that had been built partiality on flock mentality turning on.

"You'll find out answers as soon as possible, what?" Pinkfoot asked in an imitation of Greylag.

Dot chortled quietly. "Yes. I will. I don't want to leave you six, so I'll ask Greylag to look for my friend on his scouting expeditions."

"I thought he had finished those because of molting," Pinkfoot honked as they padded over to the five goslings and Greylag, who was just about to start instructing them on how you dealt with a rabid animal.

"He's getting his feathers back. And, a military goose's searching for enemies is never finished," Dot told her, angling her head toward Greylag. "Including rabid ones. Now, go on and listen."

* * *

Her only hope, Dot realized while talking to Pinkfoot, was Snowy, the mute swan. She had seemed so wise after she had looked over Dot's eggs, even gave her advice that her goslings would be the pride of her heart, and the joy of her life.

So, Greylag, at Dot's asking, had searched the marsh for Snowy, but the mute swan hadn't been found. The goslings were now about nine weeks old. Dot had decided to plan it so the geese would start migration when the goslings were thirteen weeks old, or about three months.

A few days later, Greylag had found a patch of nearby wild grasses, close to the nesting area. Dot had let him take the goslings there on a short walking excursion, as grain was good for the growing goslings. She hadn't gone – she felt unwell, her stomach was rolling, and occasionally sent out flashes of pain. Dot thought perhaps a change of fresh air might help keep the goslings from eating whatever plant she may have accidentally ingested. So, she had stayed at the pond to nibble on fresh grasses and roots, and hope that her stomach pains would go away.

She had just finished getting a particularly stubborn plant from the bank and settled down to do some through preening. A Dot cleaned her feathers, her thoughts were on her parents, how her mother and father had come to the marsh to raise her and her siblings. They had all returned to the farm, of course. Yet, as a year slowly passed, her siblings had either gone to other farms, or flown off on a spring migration when they were just a few months short of a year. Dot had been the one that stayed on the farm, for two years, out of five other goslings. And then the flood had came, and her parents were swept up in a tumult of water…

A loud cawing started Dot out of her thoughts, and she looked up to see a crow. The mother goose thought it might be the same crow that had attacked them at the start of the summer, but it was hard to tell with crows.

Filled up with a sudden hope, Dot decided to try something unpredictable: she spoke to the crow.

"Excuse me!" she honked up to the crow. "Could I talk to you for a moment?"

The crow blinked at her as it flew down, and no wonder, Dot thought as the other bird, a non-waterfowl bird at that, settled down onto a rock. It probably wondered what went on in her head, interrupting a bird in flight like that.

Greylag's words from weeks ago floated into her head for a moment from a shadowy corner: _I never did like the look of that crow…_

Dot firmly pushed that thought away as her stomach rolled once more. There would be time to think about that later. Right now, there was a chance, a slim chance, that this crow would know Snowy.

All she had to do was ask it.

"Yes?" the crow cawed, and Dot thought that it sounded like the same crow.

"Do you remember me, from the start of the summer?" Dot asked hopefully.

"Wait…" the crow narrowed his eyes in thought, then opened them wide. "I do! Didn't I dive down at you, and your friend?"

"Yes," Dot sighed with relief. "You did dive down at my mate and me. Listen," she added. "Do you know any birds on this marsh?"

The crow nodded. "Hmm…" His eyes narrowed in concentration. Dot waited patiently; crows sometimes took a while to answer you, unlike other birds.

"Mostly I know ducks, although I have talked to a few swans," the crow admitted finally.

"Any mute swans? You know, they stay here all year?" Dot asked.

"Pretty sure I know at least a few of them," the crow cawed.

"Then could you please find a mute swan for me?"

"Why me?" the crow asked, sounding offended. "_I'm_ not a homing pigeon."

Dot ignored that last remark, and said, "It's because you just said you know some birds on this marsh. I need you to find a female mute swan for me, because I have goslings to raise, and can't do it myself."

"Well…" the crow shuffled on his perch. "What's in it for me?"

Dot mentally scanned the farm, narrowing in on the crops. Wheat, hay, corn… "I know where you can find some corn," she blurted out.

The crow straightened, as his favorite food was corn. "Where?" he asked eagerly.

Dot pointed a wing in the direction of the distant cornfield that started a few meters away from the edge of the marsh. "There."

"Hmm…" The crow thought about this for a moment. "How do I know you're telling the truth? The corn could have been picked already."

"Even so," Dot bluffed. "There should be some kernels still left over. The military officer, who owns the corn, is rather old. These past years, he's tended to leave a few ears of corn behind."

"Are you sure?" the crow asked, eyeing her warily.

"I've lived at the nearby farm for a couple of years," she replied. "I know how the crops get taken in."

"Fine," the crow agreed, gazing away into the distance as if imagining all the corn he would be able to eat. "I suppose it's better than berries."

"Exactly; corn is much better then berries," Dot honked. "Now, do you promise to find Snowy – that's the name of the mute swan – as soon as you can?"

The crow glanced at her. "I'll try," he promised. "But don't expect a miracle."

And with a flap of his wings, the crow flew off.

* * *

Three days later, a large white swan with a gracefully arched neck found herself giving advice to a worried gray goose in a patch of reeds, nearby a small pond. A crow – and a nervous crow at that – who had said that there was a gray mother goose in need of her advice, had notified the swan earlier. The crow had mentioned that the mother goose lived by a pond, with her mate and six goslings.

"And I could tell it was you," Snowy told Dot. "Because you and Greylag are the only grey geese that I know of at this marsh, and why would a goose that didn't know me want my advice?"

Dot opened her beak to suggest a reason for why a goose would contact Snowy, but a something else came out of her beak, a question that had been nagging her for three days and wouldn't let go. "Are there any other geese here in the marsh?"

"Why, yes, there are." Snowy spoke with a thoughtful gleam in her eye. "There's a small flock of pink-footed geese, about five families – not greylag geese, dear, but are they sometimes mixed up with one another by humans. There was a black-and-white feathered couple – I think the term is barnacle geese – that left for Greenland about three months ago. Oh, and a pair of red-breasted geese."

"The black-and-white feathered couple, the barnacle geese," Dot honked. "Why did they leave?" Barnacles had recently acquired some white plumes. He could very well be related to the black-and-white geese.

Snowy hesitated. Was there worry in her voice? "They left because the one of the gander's wings had been injured while their flock stayed at the marsh for spring migration, and they had to stay here and wait for it to heal. They come from Greenland, don't you know, so they couldn't get their beaks around much of the language here. They were a bit homesick, I think, and they were flock sick too. You know, when you're missing your flock."

"You sound like you know them," Dot honked.

"I did," Snowy nodded. She shifted her weight on the soggy ground, as if nervous. "I helped them with a problem they had."

"How did you help them?" Dot asked.

Snowy fixed her with a slightly sad gaze, the thoughtfulness melting away like snow in the springtime. There was anger in the white swan's eyes too, but it wasn't directed at Dot. It was more like anger towards Snowy herself.

Before Dot could think further about this, Snowy continued, "If you want to be frank, I helped them figure out where they should put their eggs when they had to leave quickly," she explained, bitterness spreading through her whistle-like speech*. "They couldn't wait to get home. I wanted to help them. I didn't want to help them give up their eggs."

"They gave up their _eggs_?" Dot honked, shocked.

"Yes," Snowy sighed. "One to the red-breasted goose couple, one to a pink-footed goose couple, one to mute swans, and one…"

"It was to us, wasn't it?" Dot realized; it felt like the sun had risen in her mind and illuminated this new idea that made complete sense. "But why didn't you come and tell me?"

"I didn't want to tell you," Snowy admitted. "I knew the news would be shocking, and I wasn't sure what your reaction would be." She let out a quiet snort. "Not that destiny cares whether you want to do something or not."

"They gave up an egg to me," Dot murmured. "When we were naming Barnacles, Greylag thought that a goose might have given us one of her eggs; he looked just a bit more brownish than what we remembered greylag goslings to look like. I thought that if that was true, I would try to be a better mother to him than his own mother, and now I know I have to be."

"You named him Barnacles?" Snowy asked, surprised.

"Yes," Dot honked. "We didn't know what color his feathers would be, and since barnacles are so many different colours…we thought it would match."

"I see." Snowy bent her head a moment to fix one of her feathers.

"The pink-footed geese," Dot honked after a moment or two of silence. "What are they like?"

"They look rather like your type of geese, dear," Snowy honked. "A bit more brown, especially on their heads, and their necks are a bit paler. But they do have upper-wing coverts that are like yours – bluish-gray, yes? And from what I could see of a few younger geese, they don't get their pink legs at the same time you do, but it was mostly a yellowish colour." She paused, and added, "One goose that I think had goslings about the same time as you told me they get pinker legs when they're a year old."

"Snowy," Dot honked. "Did – did any of the pink-footed geese say they had given up one of their own eggs?"

Snowy blinked. "The goose I talked to mentioned that a pair of geese in the flock was thinking about it. Just in case, you know? It wasn't like the barnacle geese – these geese wanted to make sure at least one of their eggs were away in case of an owl attack. Why did you ask?"

"My daughter thinks her feathers are browner than the rest of her siblings," Dot admitted. "I'm not sure if it's just because graylag geese have some brown tinges to their feathers, or because she was given to us. But I promised her to find out all the answers I could, and I thought you would have some."

"I don't know any facts," Snowy honked. "Not for certain. But I did see that the two geese that were thinking about giving up one of their eggs had five eggs when I was leaving their pond. And then later, I was flying overhead, and I counted eleven goslings in all. Four from one couple, three from another, and only four from the two geese that were thinking about giving up one of their eggs."

"So they could have given Pinkfoot to me," Dot frowned. "Snowy, what should I tell them? Barnacles and Pinkfoot, if – alright, when – they ask me why they have different feathers, what should I tell them? I don't want to tell Barnacles that his parents _abandoned_ him just so they could get home quicker." A surprising amount of venom filled Dot's honk as she said the last few words.

"Pinkfoot already asked you about this, yes?" Snowy affirmed.

"About why she had different feathers, that's right," Dot nodded.

"First of all," Snowy spoke with a sense of purpose, "you're right that you can't tell Barnacles about why his parents gave him up. It wouldn't be good for him. Tell them…tell that that you talked to a swan that knows what happened, and that both Barnacles' and Pinkfoot's parents wanted to give you one of their eggs, so that if a predator attacked their parents' nests, they would still have eggs. And Dot, you must tell them that you accept them and love them. It is _essential_."

"I already do accept and love them," Dot told her.

"Good," Snowy replied. "Then it shouldn't be hard for you. Do you still keep watch for the cat?" she added.

"Yes," Dot honked, slightly bemused by this turn in conversation.

"I think she had kittens." Snowy shifted around a little on the marshy ground. "I was flying past where she sleeps – in an old barn, of all places, and I thought I heard mewing."

Dot blinked. "I guess I can relate to the cat slightly. We're both mothers."

"You shouldn't let that cloud your judgement about cats as a whole," Snowy said quietly.

"Has she always bothered birds here?" Dot asked; Snowy shook her head.

"No, she only came at the start of summer, just before you and Greylag, I think. There are a few humans who migrate around here for the summer – she came with a family this year. Their pet, I suppose."

"Odd," Dot honked. True, she had lived with the farmer and his wife, but had never really considered herself their _pet_.

"I suppose so," Snowy agreed, and a small frown flitted across her beak before asking, "Tell me, how are the goslings doing with swimming? I remember I never liked to swim when it was cloudy; I always preferred to swim in the sun…"

* * *

When the goslings came back home from another outing, Greylag behind them, the sun was more then halfway between it's zenith and the horizon.

"How did it go?" Dot asked, waiting patiently on the bank, as the six goslings paddled over to her, looking worn-out. Dot's stomach had gotten better, but Greylag had wanted her to rest anyway while he took the goslings a little ways beyond the pond again. He had said that it was good for the goslings to get used to the area around the pond.

"It was fine," Greylag assured her as he swam behind his offspring. "We didn't see any enemies, and we found a nice patch of rushes."

"The roots tasted great!" Snowy peeped; her second-hatched always seemed to have a bit of energy in him, no matter how tired his siblings were.

Dot felt herself relax as the goslings finished their swim and began to clamber onto the bank; she had been growing worried ever since Snowy the mute swan had left. "That's good."

"Hi, mama. Can we go to bed now?" Piper yawned as she blinked up at her mother.

"Are you feeling any better?" Barnacles asked, his white feathers showing clearly among black.

"I'm feeling fine, Barnacles," Dot answered. She blinked at Piper, worried that of all the goslings, Piper seemed the most tired. "Of course you can go to bed, but the sun's not all the way down yet. Don't you want to stay out on the pond a bit more?"

"Piper waddled quicker then all of us on the way home!" Floe peeped.

Dot glanced at Greylag in confusion. Wouldn't he have told Piper to slow down?

"I tried to get her to halt," Greylag explained, looking a tad embarrassed. "She was waddling past me now and then on the way home." He glanced at Piper, and concern flickered in his eyes. "I think she was worn out from eating too."

"Alright," Dot honked, relieved that there was a reasonable explanation for Piper's weariness. "Just listen to your father a bit more in the future, okay?" she added to Piper as Dot pressed her beak briefly to the gosling's.

"Okay, mama," Piper peeped, and then let out another yawn. She waddled past Dot, heading towards the place among the reeds where the geese usually slept.

"Sleep well," Dot called after her, and was answered by a sleepy peep.

The other goslings, after talking a bit more about their adventure ("We saw a blue jay flying overhead!" "A frog jumped out at me!"), began to file past Dot too. She let her beak rest for a moment on Snowy's beak, and Sandy's, and Floe's, before she realized that Barnacles and Pinkfoot were making no move to go to sleep as well. Instead, then were talking to each other quietly, and Dot couldn't make out what they were saying.

Greylag came up to her, making sure not to bump into Barnacles and Pinkfoot, who were still discussing something between each other. Dot noticed that he looked guilty now.

"I'm sorry," he began, but Dot shook her head.

"It's fine, Greylag." At his dubious expression, she added, "Piper is fine; she's just a little on the tired side. And you did try to get her to stop."

"I know." A little of the guilt left Greylag's face. "Dot, did you find anything out from that friend of yours? Snowy, was it?"

Dot nodded. "Yes, I did, and she told me that-"

"Mama?"

Dot stopped as Pinkfoot's voice reached her ears. She turned, away from Greylag, to look at Pinkfoot. The brownish-feathered gosling looked worried.

"Yes?" Dot asked tentatively.

"Barnacles and I need to ask you about something."

Pinkfoot sounded too nervous to be simply asking about feathers. Concerned, Dot opened her beak to respond, but Greylag beat her to it.

"What's the matter?" he asked; far from sounding like a stern commander, Greylag also seemed concerned. "Is everything alright?"

"We—" Barnacles blinked, and drew in a deep breath. "We wanted to know if you found out anything more about our feathers, why they're different colors? Pinkfoot told me you would get some answers." He sounded calmer then his sister.

Dot was suddenly grateful that Snowy had come that day. "I do have some answers. There's this mute swan that I know, and she's lived here for a while, and she…" Dot found her honk shaking a little; she tried to make it stop. "She explained why your feathers are different colors-"

"They gave us away, didn't they?" Pinkfoot was quiet; her voice was shaking. "They…they gave us away…"

Rushing forward, Dot encircled Pinkfoot in her wings. She felt like she was suddenly trying to desperately keep the gosling safe from predators and heartbreak, loneliness and the upsetting news that the mother goose knew she could not withhold; although she knew, in the end, she could not protect her daughter from any of those things, however much she wanted to.

"They thought they were doing the right thing," Dot whispered. "They wanted to keep you safe."

"How would…giving us away make us safer?" Barnacles asked, now sounding upset. Greylag padded closer to the three of them. Out of the corner of her eye, Dot saw Greylag reach out a wing to try and comfort Barnacles. The black-and-white gosling blinked at him, but didn't back away.

Dot drew away from Pinkfoot. "Snowy - she's this mute swan I know - told me that your families would have given you to us when you were still in your eggs. She said it was they did that so your families-" she didn't want to say _parents_; she doubted that she would be able to continue talking if she said that- "would still have one of their goslings to raise if their nest was attacked. They wanted to make sure you weren't hurt when you were still unhatched."

"She's sure that happened?" Barnacles blinked again, this time at Dot.

"Yes," Dot reassured him; she didn't want to hurt Barnacles by telling him the true reason why his parents had given him away. "She knows a lot of the geese here, and she picked up enough information to know that your families gave us to you because of those reasons."

"They only wanted to protect you," Greylag put in. "And Dot and I want to protect both of you too."

Dot nodded in agreement, finding herself unable to speak as Greylag continued, "I know it's not the best situation, but I promise you two, if you really want to find your families, we'll do everything we can to make sure you get to see them."

Pinkfoot and Barnacles exchanged a glance.

"It's fine, Papa," Pinkfoot whispered, and Dot's heart lifted a little. "I'm happy with you and Mama for now. I'm glad you told us."

"I'm glad too," Barnacles added, calm filling his honk once more. "And I'm fine with not meeting my real-" He broke off, frowning. "I'm fine with not meeting my other family," he finished.

"About not your feathers-" Dot began, worried if she was bringing up the wrong thing. Yet Pinkfoot and Barnacles had been concerned about that too…

"I don't mind about that, Mama," Pinkfoot told her. "My feathers just made me wonder about…about my other family, and you and Papa cleared that up for Barnacles and me, so I'm fine now."

"I don't mind my feathers either," Barnacles added. "I like them, actually."

"I like your feathers, too," Dot honked. "And that saying, about birds of a feather… It's is a load of rubbish. It doesn't matter whether you came from another goose's nest. You're still brother and sister to Piper and Floe and Snowy and Sandy. Birds of a feather doesn't apply to this flock."

Pinkfoot and Barnacles looked comforted for a moment. That was all Dot saw of their expressions before the two goslings came rushing at her, and Dot found that her wings were wrapped around them.

As Dot hugged the two goslings tightly, she felt a mixed emotion of joy and relief rise up inside her. Pinkfoot and Barnacles still thought of her as their mother, and nothing could change that.

* * *

*Mute swans aren't exactly mute; "their hoarse, muffled trumpet or bugle call given during territorial defense doesn't carry like the calls of other swan species." Also, when communicating with each other in a group, mute swans usually whistle, growl, or snort at one another, hence the reason for Snowy's whistle-y voice when she talks to Dot. (found from All About Birds website).


End file.
